It's a stupid default setting that consumers were not made aware of. Apple really should change the default setting, but the new alert is better than what we had before.
This.
I really don't understand why Apple can't wrap it's head around implementing easier iTunes purchases.
This, too. In fact, I'd say the constant annoying Apple insistence on passwords (and iTunes EULA update agreements) is a major reason why parents naturally assumed that there was no timeout.
Very ignorant to call the parents dumb, lazy, and not caring. Not many ppl knew of this 15min window including non parents. It' not in a instruction booklet about and it doesn't say anything about it when entering your password. A lot of us only know about it from this forum and news of parents getting screwed by the problem.
Like many, I didn't learn about it until I got a $250+ receipt from Apple.
Hell I didn't even know android had a 30 min window until read about in a post in this thread.
The difference is, Android defaults to requiring a password for each purchase unless you change the setting.
Here's my story: my daughter had always used an Android tablet, because it had Flash support for the popular kids' games like Moshi Monsters. Even a cheap tablet ran it pretty well.
No problem whatsoever on Android with IAPs. If she tried to buy something for real, I always had to authorize it.
Then I got an iPad and figured she could try it out. We downloaded a game, and I gave it to her to play with while I was surfing on the other tablet. I wasn't worried, because I figured that iOS was at least as safe as Android was.
Now, I rarely used iTunes to buy anything, so I had it set to send receipts to a rarely used email. A few days later I just happened to check that email, and was shocked to see the $250+ set of bills coming in from Apple.
(Btw, this is another problem: unlike Google, Apple lets multiple bills pile up before they send a receipt. In fact, I continued to get purchase notices for another day or so. Thanks, Apple.)
My first thought was that obviously someone had hacked my iTunes account, since I knew I hadn't authorized these purchases. Then, looking closer, I realized they might be IAPs from my daughter's game. I went and asked her, and she said "Yes Daddy, I bought some character clothes and other stuff". To her, it was no different than when she did the same in Moshi Monsters and other games with virtual money.
I still didn't understand how she was able to pay for it with iTunes, but resigned to paying for her innocent mistake, I wrote Apple support and only asked how I could prevent it from happening in the future.
To my surprise, they wrote back that they understood the purchases were unauthorized, and immediately offered a full refund. That was nice, but it would've been even nicer if it had never taken up my time at all.
